Honesdale business owner charged with illegally burning and burying waste

State officials have filed criminal charges against a Wayne County man accused of illegally burning and burying waste in Wayne County. Attorney General Linda Kelly identified the defendant as Joseph Bunnell, 50. Bunnell is the owner of Bunnell Waste Removal Inc., 267 Tryon St., Honesdale.

According to the complaint, from January 2009 through February 2012, Bunnell allegedly obtained thousands of dollars from customers by misrepresenting that their waste was being disposed of properly at a landfill.

Kelly said that Bunnell allegedly provided customers with bogus landfill weigh tickets that falsely indicated their buried and burned waste was legally disposed of at the landfill.

The charges say that instead of properly disposing of the waste, Bunnell buried and burned it at his property in Honesdale Borough or at a property in Buckingham Township.

The Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Environmental Crimes Section investigated the matter with assistance from the state’s Department of Environmental Protection. The case will be prosecuted in Wayne County by Senior Deputy Attorney General Brian Coffey of the Attorney General’s Environmental Crimes Section.

Bunnell is charged with two counts of illegal transportation, one count of illegal dumping, one count of illegal burning, one count of illegal storage, one count of deceptive or fraudulent business practices, one count of theft by deception, and one count of corrupt organizations.

The charges were filed on December 28, and Bunnell was arraigned before Honesdale Magisterial District Judge Theodore Mikulak and released on $2,500 unsecured bail.